Ultimate Supernatural Horror Box Set (174 page)

Lucas released Damien from his grip and stepped away.  Harry wondered if Lucas had done so to allow a fight to happen, but all seemed okay when Damien remained in place.  The young lad seemed to be thinking something over. 

“You better keep your accusations to yourself from now on,” Damien told Nigel, “because I’ll tell you something: I’m bloody cold tonight, and kicking your arse would be a nice way to warm up!”

Harry was glad that, yet again, Damien had been reigned in.  In fact, he started to wonder whether the thug was as unreasonable and bloodthirsty as people made out.  He considered giving the lad the benefit of the doubt. 

At least for now
. 

“Can we get a beer for Damien?” Harry asked.

Damien shook his head.  “I’m good.  I found that old drum in the basement, Steph, but I need help dragging it up.  Then we should be able to start a decent fire and get some goddamn heat in here.”

Harry raised an eyebrow.  “Really?  That’s great.  I’ll come and help you.”

Damien nodded and walked back through the hatch, disappearing through the narrow door behind the bar.  Harry followed him into the rear corridor and then down the stairs into the cellar.  At the bottom, he found Damien and Old Graham waiting next to a rusty old drum that appeared to have been dragged out of a cluttered corner (if the trail of candle-lit debris was anything to go by).  The cellar was a mess, with mounds of rotting wood and cardboard promotion stands for various beer companies making up several piles around the small square space. 

“You going to help or not?” Damien asked, tipping the drum onto its edge.

Harry hurried over and grabbed the barrel’s rim, while Old Graham kicked away any obstructions that covered the route to the stairs.  Turned out the old man was quite spry for his age.

“After three,” said Harry.  “One…two…three…”  He and Damien heaved, and began rolling the drum along on its edge, heading for the bottom of the stairs.  It was empty but still substantial in weight; Harry felt his hands chafing under the pressure.  “How are we going lift it up the stairs?” he asked as they neared the bottom step.

Damien laughed.  “Back giving out on you?  We’ll just lift it, step by step.  Piece of piss.”

The two of them stopped at the stairway and righted the drum back onto its base, dropping it down with a
Wong! 
“Okay,” said Harry.  “You ready?”

“Ready for what?  A bit of lifting?”

Harry shook his head, unwilling to get into a pissing contest.  He turned to look at Old Graham.  “Maybe you could gather up some of this cardboard so we can use it for the fire?”

Old Graham nodded and got to work.

Harry signalled to Damien and the two began to lift.  They hoisted the drum onto the first step with little effort, and then again onto the second and third.  By the fourth, Harry was starting to lose his breath.  “Can we stop a sec,” he said.

Damien shook his head.  “Can we bollocks!  Come on, I’m freezing.  Maybe if you didn’t drink so much, you’d have more stamina.”

Harry felt his pulse quicken as he fought the urge to slap some respect into the cretinous little sod, but decided to let his actions argue for him.  “Right, come on then!”  He tried to sound full of vigour, despite the tightness in his chest.  “Last thing I want is for your delicate little body to get cold.”

Damien snickered but didn’t rebuke.  The two of them continued hoisting the steel drum upwards.  They scaled the fifth step and then the sixth.  The seventh and eight were hard work but they managed to shift the deadweight up using their feet underneath to kick it upwards.  With two more steps left, Harry looked forward to finally releasing the drum at the top.  His shoulders burned with fire while his lungs had started to cramp up.  Damien was right; a year of constant drinking had left Harry in the physical state of a man twice his age.  He felt ashamed. 

Just two more steps though and it’s done.  You can make it.

They hoisted the drum once more, jarring it upwards with their arms.  The barrel rose and Damien began to slide it up onto the next step.  As he did so, the bottom edge of the barrel struck against the lip of the step.  Harry pushed his side up, trying to clear the two centre-metres needed to get the drum up onto the platform, but found himself unable to move.  He strained harder, willed his arms to move, but instead they lowered against his control.  Harry’s strength diminished; his grip gave out completely.

Damien cursed as the weight in his hands doubled.  Harry watched helplessly as the lad tried to keep the drum under control, attempting to trap it with his leg.  Somehow, despite Damien’s best efforts, it twisted sideways and rolled away from them both. 

Harry tripped backwards onto the step above as the drum fell past him and began a spiralling journey back down the stairs.  His spirits plummeted further as he realised all of the hard work his weakness had just wasted, all the time it would take to try and get the drum back up the stairs again – time the people freezing in the other room did not have. 

But Harry felt a hundred times worse when he realised that Old Graham was bent over at the bottom of the stairs, gathering cardboard, oblivious to the danger hurtling towards him.

The barrel picked up speed.

Chapter Nineteen

Jess couldn’t stop worrying about Peter.  She also worried about her mum and dad, who would be in turn worrying about her.  They were usually still awake now, despite the late hour, finishing off a bottle of wine and arguing.  She hoped they were too drunk to notice that she wasn’t home yet, or that the world was slowly being swallowed up by an endless snowstorm.  Jess old herself they would be fine, but still she worried about them all the same.  Mostly though, right now, she was worried about Peter. 

She looked down at her sleeping friend and was surprised to find that his injuries still had the ability to shock her.  Peter’s left eye was caked in a thick veneer of canary-yellow, custardy puss.  It wasn’t what disturbed her most however; it was the deep carvings sliced into his clammy flesh. 
Send out the sinner
.

Whatever it meant, it was the work of sickos, for sure.  Peter never did anything to hurt anyone.  He was sweet and gentle, probably the nicest boy she’d ever known.  Not like the usual football-obsessed dickheads she usually met online.  She looked down at Peter’s gore-crusted face and saw that, despite the blood, she could still make out his gentle features and soft lips.  Before tonight, she had sometimes thought about what it would be like to kiss them.  She wondered if he’d ever thought about kissing her too. 

Bloody Hell, Jess!  Peter’s lying here, dying, and you’re thinking about making out with him.  Jeez!

At that moment, Peter opened his eye.  Jess didn’t notice at first, but when he started to moan it startled her.  He continued moaning until the strangled noises eventually began to form words.  “Jess…ica.”

Jess nodded and smiled, tears gushing down her cheeks.  “Yes, yes, it’s me.  I was so worried about you, Peter.  What on Earth happened to you?”

Peter focused intensely on her for a moment, lips puckering as if preparing for some great speech.  She hoped it wasn’t going to be a final one.  “Jessica…” he grimaced, “listen…to me.”

She put a hand against his cheek.  It throbbed heat like a radiator.  “I am, Peter.  I’m here.”

“Get away,” he said, “out of here.”

Jess blinked.  “What do you mean?”

A hiss of air whistled in Peter’s nostrils as though forcing its way past a blockage.  He repeated himself, but more weakly, like he was going to lose consciousness again at any moment.  “Get away.  They are…coming.”

Peter’s good eye rolled back in his head and then disappeared behind his drooping eyelid.  He was gone again. 
Maybe forever
, Jess contemplated sadly.  Before she had time to consider what Peter had been trying to tell her, she was alerted by a crash. 

Followed by cries of pain; screams of agony. 

What is happening now?  I don’t think I can take any more
.

Jess felt numb and moved sluggishly.  Making her way over to the bar area, she could see that a commotion had already begun to take place.  Harry, Damien, and the old man were missing, but Lucas, Steph, and Nigel were milling around the bar looking concerned.  She searched for Jerry and found him on his own, sitting at a table in the corner.  He was shivering and didn’t seem to be paying much attention to anything that was going on.  She made a mental-note to check up on him later.  Kath sat nearby too, also seemingly uninterested in anything that was going on.  When Jess reached the bar she found herself face to face with Lucas, who was making his way through the bar hatch to the staff side.  He stopped when he saw her. 

“What’s going on?” she asked him.

“Dunno, lass.  The menfolk went downstairs to get us something for a fire.  Next thing we know there’s a load of caterwauling.”  Lucas moved into the doorway behind the serving area that led into the back of the pub, leaving the candlelight of the bar and fading into the shadows.  Before disappearing completely, he turned back to her.  “You coming or not, lass?”

Jess stood for a moment then nodded.  She followed after Lucas into the unlit corridor, groping against the wall to keep herself steady.  Further on down, the sounds of someone in pain became clearer, and so did other sounds…people bickering.  It sounded like Harry and Damien.  She hoped everyone was alright, but worried that Damien had lashed out and hurt somebody; broken Harry’s nose or worse?

Lucas sparked his lighter and the corridor lit up in a flood around them.  He reached out to stop Jess before she bumped into him.  “I think they’re down there,” he said. 

To their left was an open doorway leading to a narrow staircase.  A breeze seemed to wisp up from the cellar and tickle Jess’s cheeks and the inside of her nostrils. 

Lucas placed his hands either side of his mouth and shouted down the stairs.  “You fellas okay down there?  We heard yelling.”

After a few seconds a voice that Jess recognised as Harry’s floated up the stairs.  “We need help.  Graham is hurt.  It was my fau-”

“Just get some light down here and some blankets.”  The new voice was Damien’s, cutting off Harry mid-sentence.  “We’ve had a slight screw-up but everything’s going to be sound.”

Jess couldn’t help feeling that things were most definitely
not
going to be ‘sound’.  Peter was on death’s door and now the old man was injured. 

Two down…  How many more to go?

Jess gut told her they were all in for a long night and that their troubles were not yet over. 

Not by a long shot.

###

Kath almost felt bad. 

Almost
. 

It had, after all, been Peter’s decision to run off to look for the stupid girl; no one had made him do it.  Ironically, Kath was the one who ended up finding Jess anyway, and that had just proved even more how idiotic the boy was for not listening to her.  Still, she couldn’t help but ruminate about what had happened. 

Someone messed him up real good.  Probably crossed the wrong people; Polish Mafia or something. 
Kath suddenly had another thought:
Or there really is a psychopath stalking us all? 

If there
was
a sadistic madman running amok out there, was she going to be safe here in the pub?  It didn’t feel like it.  The Trumpet was full of degenerates from what she’d seen so far.

You had Lucas, prancing around like a drunken leprechaun; Nigel, an ugly man that lacked any personality she could discern of; Steph, a low-class tramp; and that insufferable girl, Jess.  Of all the people Kath could be trapped with, Jess would have been last on her handwritten list.  Her little buddy from the video shop was no less irritating, backing up her absurd stories just so he could get into her filthy knickers –
if the slut even wears any
.  Next was Damien, a walking billboard for dysfunctional youth and petty crime.  Finally, you had the pensioner, stinking of piss and beer, and the alcoholic loser, Harry.  She could tell Harry was a drunk because he had that same weathered look on his face that her father used to have.  A slow, draining sickness that killed a man one drink at a time; made him neglect everything important. 

Maybe if Kath’s father hadn’t been such a deadbeat she could have finished her History degree and actually done something with her life.  Instead she ended up supporting
him
until she hit twenty-eight.  The day she found her father lying on the floor, fading from a heart attack had been a turning point for her.  The thought of him pleading with her to call for help, while she stood there shaking her head and watching him die, was significant to her.  It was the day she decided she would no longer let anyone take advantage of her.  She would look out only for herself from then on.  Selfish, lazy drunks like Harry could go right to Hell. 

All around Kath, the degenerates scuttled around like displaced ants, clutching blankets and bottles of water, carrying them in a line.  Something was happening in one of the backrooms of the pub, but Kath couldn’t say she really cared.  She was only with these people for safety, and the last thing she wanted was to be involved with them beyond that. 

Maybe the thug has finally thrown a punch at the drunk,
she thought. 
Punch drunk!

She laughed out loud, but secretly hoped that harmless bickering was all that was happening in the back, but when she thought again about who had thrown Peter through the window, and why, she started to worry that there was far more danger lurking in the air tonight than a simple punch up.  

“Well,” she said out loud. “I’d best go see what those idiots have gotten themselves into.”

Kath stood up and headed for the darkness of the corridor.

Chapter Twenty

“I’m so sorry, Graham.”  Harry looked down at the old man’s twisted leg and felt the urge to punch himself in the face.  How could he be so stupid, getting caught in a testosterone contest with a kid ten years his junior?  He was pathetic and for the first time was finally realising it.  He put his hand on Old Graham’s shallow chest and could feel the man’s ribs through tissue-paper skin.  The scar below Harry’s knuckles reminded him that he had a habit of hurting people.